ON AUDIO

YOU KNOW ME, AL. By Ring Lardner. Read by Bernie Kraft. Book of the Road. $14.95.

First published in 1916, this epistolary novel is a baseball classic that has aged very well indeed. Jack is a talented but impetuous and naive young pitcher trying to break into the major leagues. His letters home to his best friend, Al, tell the hilarious story of his successes and failures.

This should be mandatory for every major league prospect, and anyone who loves baseball or good satire. Kraft reads with spirit and empathy.

-- THE WORD FOR THE WORLD IS FOREST. By Ursula K. LeGuin. Read by Laurence Ballard. Book of the Road. $14.95.

Science fiction has grown up, and there's no better example of this new maturity than LeGuin. This unabridged reading of an award-winning novel conveys all the literary craftsmanship and emphasis on character and ideas over technology that makes LeGuin equal to just about any mainstream writer going.

The story details a revolt of indigenous homonoids against rapacious human invaders on a thoroughly believable alien planet. It raises questions of ecology, exploitation and genocide, but the narrative pace never flags for an instant.

The main villain is apparently based on John Wayne, and satirizes the competent heroes of more traditional science fiction novels; yet, he's too familiar, too well-drawn, to be completely hateful. Highly recommended.

-- THE KILLER INSIDE ME. By Jim Thompson. Read by Denis Arndt and Brenda Hubbard. Book of the Road. $14.95.

Fine audio version of Thompson's classic thriller about a homicidal maniac who happens to be a sheriff's deputy in a small west Texas town. The story is not only a riveting exploration of the psychopathic mind, but also a complex and satisfying mystery.

Thompson audaciously tells the story from the killer's point of view without losing suspense. The introduction of a female voice into the dialogue in what is otherwise a straight, unadorned reading is at first disconcerting, but is not ultimately a serious distraction.

This is an anthology of three horror stories by three premier writers in the genre. It is vastly uneven. The story by Grant is very weak; the Ligotti story is written with great style but ultimately the conclusion (or lack of one) is disappointing, especially considering the length of the piece.

Straub's story, however, The Juniper Tree, is one of the finest I have ever read in any genre. It details the coming of age of a young, neglected boy in a small town in the 1950s. Why this is categorized a horror story, I don't know; what happens to the boy is indeed horrible, but involves nothing supernatural or even fantastic. It happens all the time, in every town. This story recalls all the terror and courage of childhood and it alone is worth the price of the tape.

-- THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN. By John Fowles. Read by Jeremy Irons. Audio Editions. $15.95.

Irons, of course, was Meryl Streep's co-star in the film version of this much-admired modernistic Victorian romance. I don't know if it is the abridgement or the extremely British reading by Irons, but this version lacks the good humor of the book, and the sense of urgency and moral failure of the movie.

Still, it captures some of Fowles' low-key, intentionally supercilious satire. And the beauty of the love between the snooty, titled scientist Charles and the ruined woman herself comes through. Enjoyable enough but oddly unsatisfying.

-- THE BOOK OF JOB. Read by Peter Coyote. Audio Literature. $9.95.

Audio Literature is dedicated to producing first-rate productions of spiritual classics from around the world. This modern version of Job is superb. I thought Coyote an odd choice as reader, but his flat, laconic voice, which recalls Henry Fonda and the desolation of the American West, is surprisingly adept at conveying Job's despair at the loss of his family, fortune and health in the wager between Satan and God.

Almost every question about the nature of good and evil, justice and mercy, and the relation between man and a truly Supreme Being, is raised and settled in this, the oldest book in the Bible. The success of this reading also underscores the origins of Scripture as oral literature. Worth multiple listenings.

-- THE CARDINAL OF THE KREMLIN. By Tom Clancy. Read by David Ogden Stiers. Simon & Schuster. $14.95.

Tom Clancy is nobody's idea of a great writer, but he has a fair idea of how superpower diplomacy works, he has an insider's knowledge of high-tech weaponry, and above all, he knows how to keep a story going.

Considering the length of Clancy's books and how much must have been cut for this abridgement, this version is amazingly lucid and easy to follow. Stiers gives a breathtaking performance, slipping into dozens of accents -- Afghan, various Russian, innumerable regional American -- without a moment's hesitation. The only point at which Clancy stumbles significantly is in his portrayal of a lesbian spy whose sexual orientation is made to seem part and parcel of her villainy. Clancy is weak on all his women characters, but that's not what we read him for. Not believable for an instant, but great fun for buffs of big, dumb thrillers.